Sunday, April 11, 2010

SomeBeans, the under-gardener, has picked up a lot of knowledge about gardening and plant names, just through the process of osmosis. Years of Gardener's question Time, Gardener's World, and trawling round gardens and garden centres has led to some of it being absorbed.

Not all of it, however, is absorbed completely correctly. I suspect that it's deliberate...

So, we have Camillas instead of Camellias, Mangolias instead of Magnolias (though SomeBeans was recently vindicated in this by a single mention of Mangolia in a journal extract of Ernest 'Chinese' Wilson in a book I was reading. I maintain that it was a typing error.

This is the time of year when the flowering currant, Rabies, apparently looks its best. We also have Solomon's Seed rather than Seal. There's also Dicentrica, a rather weird mix of the correct name and an energy company.

"Dicentrica"

SomeBeans is triumphant if I occasionally make the mistake of saying any of these the wrong way (i.e. his way). So forgive me if I make reference to Dicentrica, Camillas and Mangolias when I'm in polite gardening company - it's peer pressure.

6 comments:

The Hubster refers to my Gunnera as a Gonorrhoea. That gets us into trouble in garden centres...

But usually I just have to put up with him sniggering at every rude-sounding plant name or anything that looks phallic. Oh, and rolling down the window and shouting "SWINGERS!!" as we drive past any house with pampas grass in the front.